At the rainbow's end....

Today, I saw the most beautiful rainbow ever ... In all my growing years never such a beautiful one..

I had gone for my math classes at a math institute away from the city on a very ordinary sultry summer 'noon in Chennai. After a couple of hours of class and rather fruitful discussion with my professor, I boarded the bus at 5 in the evening and waited for it to finally budge and give us the badly needed cool air which has but become a rarity these days. If there is something I despise about this city, it is undoubtedly the heat. I don't even know how to explain it! Having been born in Dubai and having lived there for almost two decades, I am supposed to have gotten used to the heat. But Chennai is hot in a different way. I have developed a knack of sweating and dripping even while sitting idle in my room with the fan in max speed, let alone when I go out in the sun. Even having bath four times a day doesn't seem to help! As a friend says, it is having bath that makes you sweat more... and I am beginning to believe it. Anyway, getting back to my colorful rainbow story.. I stuck my hand out of the window and felt a few drops of water falling on my hand. I indicated to a few friends in the bus that it probably was going to drizzle. A friend laughed it off saying the sky was clear and claiming it was the water being sprayed at the huge construction site beside the institute. I glanced at another girl and said looking up, will it please rain, I want to see the rain! Just then it started drizzling and my friend turned to me astonished at my profound prophecy.

The bus began moving we left the windows open to feel the cool breeze and the drops of rain splash across our faces. And then.... We saw the rainbow... oh so bright.. so beautiful in the backdrop of a light blue almost clear sky.. it was a sight I would always remember.. and just as we gazed at it, we saw another one a little above it though not as visible.. a friend studying engineering physics explained to us why there is a secondary rainbow with the colors inverted. But what I enjoyed today was an experience I would like to believe was a miracle of joy rather than a sheer physical phenomena of refraction of light through a spherical water droplet. At times I feel children should first be taught to enjoy nature to its fullest well before they begin to learn the science behind it. My eyes where glued to the sky for as long as I could see the rainbows. I saw the two arches completely and wondered, 'Does one actually have to reach the rainbow's end to find the pot of gold?'. The rainbow is God's way of assuring us that no matter how tough life is, it brings with it such goodness. Or else, how could I have imagined to feel the rain and see the twin rainbows on such a hot day... As I was smiling at myself thinking of God's little afternoon miracle, the bus reached IIT and we hopped off. I looked around and everything was as usual. As though all the beauty had been meant only for me. Yes, it was.. Today nature changed its course a little for me.. and I feel so loved.